Car bomb kills 40 in Pakistan

MULTAN, Pakistan – At least 40 people were killed and more than 100 wounded when a car bomb exploded at a rally to commemorate an assassinated militant religious leader in central Pakistan early yesterday, police said.

The blast ripped through a crowd of mourners leaving the overnight rally attended by several thousand in the city of Multan to mark the first anniversary of the shooting of extremist Sunni religious leader Azam Tariq. “It was dark and people were screaming for help,” said one witness.”It was utter chaos.”The attack came just days after a suicide bomber killed 30 people at a minority Shi’ite Muslim mosque in the eastern city of Sialkot on October 2 and information minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said it could have been a sectarian act of revenge.Prime minister Shaukat Aziz convened an emergency meeting and the interior ministry would propose a ban on large religious gatherings, interior minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao told reporters.The rally had ended and people were dispersing in pre-dawn darkness from a meeting ground in the Rasheedabad area when the bomb exploded, said Sikander Hayat, police chief in Multan, a city 425 km southwest of the capital, Islamabad.Large patches of blood stained the ground and pieces of flesh lay scattered around.Nearby houses and shops were damaged.Hospital officials said at least 40 people were killed and more than 100 wounded, 30 of them seriously.Troops were deployed in the streets after about 3 000 Sunni protesters gathered outside the main Nishtar hospital to collect bodies for burial and chanted slogans against Shi’ites and against president Pervez Musharraf.”Infidels, infidels, Shia infidels!” they shouted.Most of the casualties were followers of Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (Soldiers of Mohammad’s Companions), an outlawed Sunni group that Tariq headed and which has been blamed for many bloody attacks on Shi’ites, who make up about 15 percent of Pakistan’s mainly Sunni population of 150 million.The bomb was probably detonated by remote control, police chief Hayat said.He earlier said the attack appeared to have been a suicide bombing.One of the wounded, Qari Hafeez, speaking from his hospital bed, said the car had been driven into the crowd.”When we came out of the rally at around 4h30 in the morning, a car came at us with its lights on.It hit the people and exploded.After that, I don’t know what happened.”Sipah-e-Sahaba was one of seven militant groups outlawed by Musharraf after he joined the US-led war on terror following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.Like other such organisations, it took another name after being banned – Millat-e-Islamia (Islamic Nation).The leader of the renamed group, Maulana Muhammad Ahmed Ludhianvi, blamed Shi’ite radicals for the blast.He appealed to his followers to remain calm.But addressing thousands gathered to offer funeral prayers, he demanded that the government track down those responsible within a week or he would call for a march on Islamabad.- Nampa-Reuters”It was dark and people were screaming for help,” said one witness.”It was utter chaos.”The attack came just days after a suicide bomber killed 30 people at a minority Shi’ite Muslim mosque in the eastern city of Sialkot on October 2 and information minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said it could have been a sectarian act of revenge.Prime minister Shaukat Aziz convened an emergency meeting and the interior ministry would propose a ban on large religious gatherings, interior minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao told reporters.The rally had ended and people were dispersing in pre-dawn darkness from a meeting ground in the Rasheedabad area when the bomb exploded, said Sikander Hayat, police chief in Multan, a city 425 km southwest of the capital, Islamabad.Large patches of blood stained the ground and pieces of flesh lay scattered around.Nearby houses and shops were damaged.Hospital officials said at least 40 people were killed and more than 100 wounded, 30 of them seriously.Troops were deployed in the streets after about 3 000 Sunni protesters gathered outside the main Nishtar hospital to collect bodies for burial and chanted slogans against Shi’ites and against president Pervez Musharraf.”Infidels, infidels, Shia infidels!” they shouted.Most of the casualties were followers of Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (Soldiers of Mohammad’s Companions), an outlawed Sunni group that Tariq headed and which has been blamed for many bloody attacks on Shi’ites, who make up about 15 percent of Pakistan’s mainly Sunni population of 150 million.The bomb was probably detonated by remote control, police chief Hayat said.He earlier said the attack appeared to have been a suicide bombing.One of the wounded, Qari Hafeez, speaking from his hospital bed, said the car had been driven into the crowd.”When we came out of the rally at around 4h30 in the morning, a car came at us with its lights on.It hit the people and exploded.After that, I don’t know what happened.”Sipah-e-Sahaba was one of seven militant groups outlawed by Musharraf after he joined the US-led war on terror following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.Like other such organisations, it took another name after being banned – Millat-e-Islamia (Islamic Nation).The leader of the renamed group, Maulana Muhammad Ahmed Ludhianvi, blamed Shi’ite radicals for the blast.He appealed to his followers to remain calm.But addressing thousands gathered to offer funeral prayers, he demanded that the government track down those responsible within a week or he would call for a march on Islamabad.- Nampa-Reuters